Bearing Witness

by Michael A. Kahn

  He leaned forward on the podium, his voice more fervent now. “When that blessed day comes, praise Jesus, in a time not too distant from today, then we must each of us be prepared to fight for that just and holy cause, for that righteous and God-fearing government dedicated to the preservation and propagation of a nation of Christian men and women of Aryan descent.” Another pause, and then a pensive shake of his head. “Jesus teaches us that there will be bloodshed and that there will be fighting and that there will sacrifice. But Jesus implores each of us to do our part in this holy cause, in this, His holy war, blessed be He.” Another pause, and then, in a louder voice, “It is our destiny.”

  As the sermon continued, Bishop Robb eased his foot off the rhetorical pedal in order to explain for the newcomers in the crowd the basic tenets of the “Identity Church” movement, within which his peculiar church clearly fit. Anglo-Saxons were the “chosen people”—the lost tribe of the House of Israel, the true descendants of Adam and Eve, the actual chosen people for whom Jesus was sent. Jews were the children of Satan—“Satan’s spawn,” in Bishop Robb’s words, born not of Adam and Eve but of Eve and Satan, set on the earth to destroy the “chosen people” through Talmudic teaching, forced interracial mixings, and sexual perversions. Jews had mated with beasts of the jungle to produce the subhuman “mud peoples”—blacks, Asians, Hispanics. And now, in fulfillment of their mission as Satan’s spawn, the Jews were financing guerrilla training of the “mud peoples” to enable them to seize control of the major cities and enslave the Aryan youth of the nation through the dissemination of cocaine, heroin, and other drugs.

  It was a theology so warped that at first it sounded like a bad Saturday Night Live routine—and then you realized with a shudder that Bishop Robb was real, and these congregants were true believers.

  Jonathan had given me a brief bio on the drive down. Robb had returned to his hometown, Baton Rouge, after his final tour of duty as a Green Beret in Vietnam. He took a job as a driver’s ed instructor at his old high school, but the place felt even more alien than Southeast Asia. His rage grew as he watched antiwar protesters mock his America. Women’s liberation, civil rights marches, gay rights movements—it was an abominable travesty. When he finally attended his first meeting of the Baton Rouge chapter of the American Nazi Party, it was as if he’d discovered that special place he called home.

  It was not a smooth homecoming. Over the next two decades he would drift from one white supremacist organization to another, often severing his ties after bitter fallings out over seemingly trivial ideological differences. In the early 1980s, Robb rose to an influential position within the Louisiana-based National Emancipation of Our White Seed, but he disappeared in 1983, only to resurface three years later as the editor of the Battle Axe News, the house organ of the Christian Defense League. Before that organization collapsed in the late 1980s amid a blizzard of federal indictments, it had been tied to the firebombing of an Orthodox synagogue in Belleville, Illinois, and the attempted bombing of an oil pipeline from Tulsa to Chicago that ran along southern Missouri curving up through St. Louis.

  Then came another gap in Robb’s biography until he surfaced in 1994 as the spiritual leader of the Church of the Aryan Jesus, located in a rural area of Jefferson County south of St. Louis. Last year, Robb expanded his responsibilities by announcing the formation of “Spider,” an organization whose mission was to bring the neo-Nazi movement into the urban centers of America. “Adolf Hitler created the Third Reich in downtown Berlin,” he announced at the opening ceremonies, “not in some remote patch of the Black Forest.” He proudly billed Spider’s St. Louis offices as the “Midwest Headquarters of the White Race.” Although he was savvy enough to keep the swastika off the literature and logos, Spider’s official emblem was still spooky: a black widow spider with a grinning skull in place of the spider’s thorax.

  Robb was reaching the end of his sermon. “Let us rise,” he announced as he turned toward the flagpole. He placed his hand over his heart. The congregants got to their feet amid the rumbling and scraping of the folding chairs. They all placed their hands over their hearts.

  One of Robb’s assistants had stepped onto the stage by the flagpole. He reached down to grasp the end of the limp flag, and then stepped back to unfurl it for all to see. It was a replica of the American flag, except that in place of the stars there was a white cross against a black background.

  “We pledge our allegiance,” Robb solemnly recited, accompanied in unison by the crowd, “to our fighting Aryans and to a pure, white United States. We offer praise unto Jesus Christ, our Aryan Messiah, and we beseech Him to lead our sacred army to victory and to join us in our holy battle cry: Free America!”

  After a long pause, Bishop Kurt Robb turned back to the crowd. “God bless you,” he said quietly, dropping his head, “and amen.”

  “Amen,” they answered.

  Disheartened, I watched as members of the audience crowded forward to shake his hand or touch his sleeve. With his slight twang and folksy mannerisms, Kurt Robb could have been a commercial airline pilot coming over the PA system to tell us that “we’re gonna keep that lil’ ol’ seat belt sign on jes’ a bit longer ’cause we may be catching a patch of turbulence up ahead a ways.”

  There was nothing Hitleresque about this Hitler wannabe, and that made him even scarier.

  ***

  Hey, Jew Boy!”

  Jonathan spun toward the voice. There were two of them coming down the sidewalk toward us. White guys with buzz cuts—one tall and one short, dressed like Robb’s bodyguards in faded jeans and letter jackets. The short guy had a goatee and crooked, tobacco-stained teeth. He walked with a bowlegged strut. The tall guy had a beer gut and moved more like a bear. In one of his huge hands he was holding a wooden dowel the length of a baseball bat and the diameter of a broom handle. With a snap of his wrist, he sliced it back and forth through the air.

  Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

  I glanced behind me. Our car was less than twenty feet away. We’d parked in a residential area two blocks over from the Reavis Banquet Center. The center’s lot had been full when we arrived.

  Jonathan pulled me close as he moved backward down the sidewalk toward the car. For some reason, I thought of all the new windows and windshield in his car.

  “Don’t be stupid,” Jonathan told them, his voice unyielding.

  The big guy looked over at his comrade and chuckled. “Hear that, Bobby? Guy here says, don’t be stupid. You feeling stupid?”

  Bobby snorted. “Fuck no, partner.”

  “Me, neither.” He turned to Jonathan. “I’ll tell you who’s stupid, Rabbi. Guy like you who shows up at a Bishop Robb event, sticking that big Jew nose where it don’t belong. That’s what I call stupid. Ain’t that right, Bobby?”

  “Fucking aye, partner.”

  Whoosh. Whoosh.

  We were even with Jonathan’s car. He reached into his jacket and handed me the keys.

  “Get in the car,” he said, and then he turned to face them. “Listen carefully,” he said, pointing his finger at the big guy. “There are two dozen cops back at the building.”

  The big guy laughed. “That’s back there, Rabbi, but we ain’t back there, are we? Two dozen? Shit, man, two thousand cops back there ain’t going do you any fucking good right here. Ain’t that right, Bobby?”

  “Fucking aye, partner.”

  I’d taken a step toward the car, but stopped. I couldn’t just leave Jonathan to face these thugs alone. My heart was racing. I didn’t know what I could do, but I refused to abandon him.

  He was standing his ground, his fists clenched, seemingly unfazed by the danger. Although I’d taken a self-defense class for six months, it was as if everything I’d learned had vanished in the face of these animals. I glanced around, looking for something to use as a weapon.

  “You should leave here now,” Jonathan told them in a
firm voice.

  “Hey,” the shorter guy snarled as he jammed his middle finger in the air. “Fuck you, kike.” His head was bobbing defiantly, his middle finger still up. “And fuck your Jew bitch, too.”

  Jonathan stared at him. “Turn around,” he finally said in a totally calm voice, “and walk away and no one gets hurt.”

  “Wrong, dickhead,” the big guy said, his face suddenly contorting in rage as he started forward. “You get hurt.”

  Jonathan burst into action. He punched the big guy in the gut just as the guy was raising the dowel. He hit him again, even harder this time, squarely in the solar plexus. The first blow staggered him, the second one toppled him. As he keeled over, wheezing in pain, Jonathan ripped the dowel from his hand and spun toward the smaller guy, who’d hesitated a moment too long before attacking. Jonathan whipped the dowel against the guy’s throat. He lurched backward with an awful gargling noise, both hands grabbing for his neck. Jonathan moved in fast and whacked him again, splintering the dowel against the side of his face. The guy collapsed, curling into a ball as he covered his head with his hands. There was a set of brass knuckles on his right hand. Jonathan stood over him, the shattered dowel raised high, waiting. The guy was moaning, blood streaming from his mouth and nose. He wasn’t going anywhere. Neither was his comrade, who was on his back near me, gasping for air, his eyes squeezed shut, his hands pressed against his ribs. The front of his jeans was soaked. The odor of warm urine was unmistakable in the chilly air.

  Stunned, I looked at Jonathan, who was standing over the smaller guy with the shattered dowel held high. Jonathan was panting, his breath vaporing in the cold, as he looked from one assailant to the other. With his yarmulke still in place and his close-trimmed dark beard, he looked every inch the Maccabee warrior. He lowered the dowel and seemed to contemplate it a moment before tossing it aside.

  He turned toward me and our eyes met.

  “Wow,” I said.

  “Are you okay, Rachel?”

  I nodded. “Sure.”

  He frowned as he reached into his coat pocket. I watched him remove his cellular phone and punch in a number.

  “Third-rate goons,” he mumbled, shaking his head as he waited for the call to go through. “Hi, this is Jonathan Wolf. You have a dozen officers stationed at Reavis Banquet Hall. Lieutenant Bradley is in charge of them. He knows who I am. Tell him I’m two blocks north on Carter Avenue. Have him send over a squad car with two officers.”

  ***

  This was definitely not shaping up to be a typical lazy Sunday. Having started our day with a Nazi diatribe and a one-round boxing match with two thugs, we were now seated in the reception area of the Sangamon County Jail in downtown Springfield waiting to interview the two skinheads arrested for Gloria Muller’s murder.

  “Boy,” I said to Jonathan, trying to force a smile, “you sure know how to show a girl a good time.”

  “Hey,” he said with a wink, “don’t forget lunch.”

  “My apologies,” I said, my spirits picking up a bit. “That was excellent.”

  Road trips require a little extra planning if you’re an Orthodox Jew. Jonathan was as likely to find a kosher meal at a food-and-gas exit along I-55 as he was to find the artist formerly known as Prince—theoretically possible, but the odds were steep. So Jonathan came prepared, having swung by the Tel Aviv Deli on his way to pick me up that morning. He deserved an A+ in deli shopping. During the drive to Springfield we had a feast of corn beef on rye with spicy mustard, potato knishes, tangy coleslaw, kosher dills, plenty of Dr. Brown’s to wash it all down, and a slice of luscious apple strudel for dessert.

  The food and the drive had helped put some distance between me and the morning’s events, but the memories had been catching up during our wait in the prison lobby. Bishop Robb’s words had been so hateful and depressing, made even more chilling by his smooth, syrupy delivery—as if we were listening to the headwaiter of Armageddon. I’d felt blue on our way to the car afterward, and then those two thugs attacked. That scene ended so quickly I found myself watching in a daze as the police hauled them away in handcuffs.

  Jonathan didn’t think Robb was behind the attack. First, he explained, Robb was too smart to order his people to beat up a prosecutor, especially with all those cops nearby. Second, the attackers were amateurs. Although they’d looked plenty menacing to me—so much so that Jonathan’s response had seemed right out of an action-hero flick—he shrugged it off, explaining that they were a pair of stumblebums.

  We’d arrived at the prison right on time. That was thirty-five minutes ago. Jonathan walked over to the clerk’s window to try to speed things up. The delay wouldn’t have surprised me if I was alone. I’d had prison officials keep me waiting for more than an hour, and those were times when I was there to see a client. But today I was with Jonathan. These prison officials knew him. He’d been here several times during his years as an assistant U.S. attorney, and he was here today in his official capacity as a special assistant attorney general on an investigation that had the official cooperation of several Illinois law enforcement agencies.

  He came back over, shaking his head.

  “What?” I asked.

  He frowned. “Something’s not right.”

  Ten minutes later, the inner door opened and a woman in her sixties stepped into the reception area. She smiled when she spotted Jonathan.

  “Hello, Wolf Man,” she said as she came over. She was a vibrant woman with sparkling blue eyes and salt-and-pepper hair cut short.

  They shook hands and Jonathan turned to introduce us. “Rachel, this is Ila Frisbie. Ila’s with the State’s Attorney’s office in Springfield, and she one tough prosecutor.”

  Ila laughed and told me she was a pussycat compared to Jonathan. Pussycat or not, she was obviously a character. She was wearing a white knit T-shirt, a long pleated blue skirt, white socks, and brown leather Birkenstocks. She had dangly earrings and a clunky necklace that she must have found at an arts-and-crafts festival. I liked her immediately.

  “So what’s going on?” Jonathan asked.

  Ila’s smiled disappeared. “Well,” she said, hesitating and glancing at me.

  “Rachel’s okay,” Jonathan said. “She witnessed the murder.”

  Ila nodded, all business now. “Let’s go inside.”

  We followed her through a security door and down a narrow hallway to a small conference room. She ushered us in and closed the door.

  “We don’t know how it happened,” she said, shaking her head.

  “Both?” Jonathan asked quietly.

  “Yep.”

  “No one else?”

  “Just those two.”

  “Knives?”

  She nodded. “All the inmates are on lockdown now.”

  “Where are the bodies?”

  She gestured toward the hall. “The infirmary. The medical examiner’s already looked at them. They’re moving them to the hospital tonight for the autopsies.”

  “I’d like to see them,” Jonathan said quietly.

  Ila raised her eyebrows and shrugged. “Sure.” She glanced over at me. “What about you, Rachel?”

  I looked at Jonathan and then back at Ila. I hadn’t seen either suspect since the arrests. If one of them was the killer, I might recognize him. “Well, okay,” I said.

  Jonathan looked at me with concern. “Are you sure, Rachel? You can wait right here. I just want to see whether they were killed execution-style. It won’t take long.”

  “I’m sure,” I said unsurely.

  We followed Ila down the hall, around the corner, past two security checkpoints, and into the jail infirmary. She led us to a closed door near the back.

  “In here,” she said, opening the door.

  I paused in the hall, staring at the floor as I psyched myself up. They didn’t teach Dead Bodies 101 at Harvard. C
ome on, I told myself, you’re a big girl. I took a deep breath and stepped into the room.

  The bodies were on steel gurneys. Mercifully, a white sheet covered each man from head to ankle, exposing only the feet. The big toe on the left foot of each corpse had been tagged. From the size of the feet and the outlines of the bodies beneath the sheets, these were large men.

  Jonathan was standing between the gurneys up by the head area. I was down by the feet. He leaned over the body on the left and pulled the sheet back, exposing the head, neck, and chest. I had feared that there’d be blood and dreadful wounds, but instead the body looked almost peacefully intact. Except for blue and purple tattoos on the chest and arms, the skin was as pale as wax, as if they’d just pulled him out of a meat locker. I moved slowly around the far side of the body to get a look at the face. The eyes were open, gazing at the ceiling. I peered closer. The face wasn’t familiar.

  Jonathan was bending over the corpse, studying the neck area. I shifted my focus to where he was looking, and reared back, almost gagging. The neck had been sliced from ear to ear. The flesh along the knife slash had puffed and curved outward, making the wound resemble a pair of slobby lips pressed into an enormous smile. I stepped back, a little woozy, and tried to focus on the wall clock on the far side.

  “Where did it happen?” Jonathan asked Ila in a clinical tone.

  “In the showers.”

  Jonathan turned from the corpse to Ila. “Both at the same time?”

  She nodded. “According to the guards, they went down together after breakfast around ten. The showers were on the whole time. The place was all steamed up when the guards went in to fetch them a few minutes before eleven. They found them on the tiles, their throats slashed.”

  Jonathan moved to the other body after covering the first one. As he pulled back the sheet, I forced my eyes to focus only on the face. The skin was chalk white, the mouth sagging open. I stared at the broad forehead and the big chin as I tried to remember back to the night in the Applebee’s parking lot. I nodded. It was the face of the shooter.